


Dusk

by sea_sighs



Category: Black Panther (2018)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Angst, ERIK DESERVED TO LIVE OK, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M, Slow Burn, an Exploration of these characters, u bet shuri is gonna roast tf out of T'Challa
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-01
Updated: 2018-03-01
Packaged: 2019-03-25 17:56:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13839999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sea_sighs/pseuds/sea_sighs
Summary: An obligatory 5 + 1 fanfic.The five times T'Challa showed mercy to Erik and the one time he didn't need to.





	Dusk

**Author's Note:**

> I will stan Erik 4 ever and no one can convince me otherwise.

1.

 

The sun washes over his raised skin, like mountains in an endless desert, cool and black and deep. At first, T’Challa thought it was pride or perhaps vanity that motivated him to mark his name on his skin. But he takes a moment to realise that perhaps it was shame.

 

“It’s beautiful” 

 

The words are tender.

 

Even to the air, even to the wind that is kissing it. It is filled to the brim with an emotion that cannot be named nor would wish to be, intimate enough that all T’Challa wishes is to look away. Maybe to have never heard of it at all. In some small part of T’Challa, he weeps.  _ We could have been brothers, you and I. And I could have loved you as my own. And you would have never known what it meant to be alone in this world. _

 

But he knows war, the price and entry and victory of it. T’Challa knows it just as he knows the man before him, a manifestation of every step in it.

 

Then again.

 

“We could save you”

 

_ Then again. _

 

There’s always that careful, quiet, exception.

 

He grins, sharpish.

 

“Nah” he says. All swagger, all bravery, all anger. It is measured, in a way that reminds T’Challa of chess.  _ Nah, _ easy as you please, a thank you, a mock bow to an audience of one.  _ Nah,  _ like its simple.  _ Nah,  _ because he can _. _

 

“Bury me in the ocean with my ancestors that jumped from the ships. Because they knew death was better than bondage”

 

And so he pulls. And pulls. And-

 

“What are you doing!?” Erik snarls, “what the hell are you doing!?”

 

There’s blood on his teeth. Blood in T’Challa’s ears. His hand on his. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know. The sound of vibranium on vibranium, the pain deep bleeding that doesn’t just come from a wound. Earth-shaking ire at the injustice of all of it.

 

All of it, T’Challa understands.

 

Maybe that is why T’Challa is no longer standing, brought, in a quick movement, to kneeling, his hands there, right there, where Erik wants them to leave. 

 

Erik hadn’t hesitated.

 

His hands went for T’Challa’s throat, his face, but the mask was up before the claw even brushed through the air. Vibranium against vibranium. Blood in his ears. Blood on Erik’s teeth.

 

The anger twists into Erik’s face, lines and canyons, a force of nature. His hands, though, are weak against T’Challa’s chest. 

 

“You give me ‘nuther chance-” he pants, “and I’m just going to kill you again”

 

“You won’t”

 

Erik laughs, bordering on hysterical as he looks down onto his wound, before looking up at T’Challa. Something though, something that isn’t anger, something more like fear edges into his words.

 

“You sure about that, cuz?”

 

The longest second passes between them, and T’Challa notes at how the dusk illuminates Erik’s eyes, that they are a shade like his own.

 

_ “Yes” _

 

_ yes. _

**Author's Note:**

> Concrit is always welcome, until the next chapter <3
> 
> ciao cari!


End file.
